Portrait of a Spy

“Are you lying to me now?”

“Just a little,” said Gabriel contritely. “I’m afraid that crumpled little soul over there isn’t really named Max.”

“But he still believes I’m a liar?”

“He’s hopeful that’s not the case. But he needs to know that we’re all on the same side before this conversation can continue.”

“What side is that?”

“The side of the angels, of course.”

“The same angels who murdered my father in cold blood.”

“There’s that word again, Nadia. Your father wasn’t murdered. He was killed by enemy forces on a battlefield of his choosing. He died a martyr’s death in the service of the great jihad. Unfortunately, the violent ideology he helped to propagate didn’t die with him. It lives on in a crescent of sacred rage stretching from the tribal areas of Pakistan to the streets of London. And it lives on in a lethal new terror network based in the mountains of Yemen. This network has a charismatic leader, a skilled operational mastermind, and a cadre of willing shahids. What it lacks is the one thing you can provide.”

“Money,” said Nadia.

“Money,” repeated Gabriel. “The question is, are you really a woman who is singlehandedly trying to change the face of the modern Middle East, or are you actually your father’s daughter?”

Nadia was silent for a moment. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to decide that without my help,” she said finally, “because as of this moment, this little interrogation session is officially over. If there is something you want from me, I suggest you tell me what it is. And I wouldn’t wait too long. You might have questions about where I stand, but you should have none about the chief of my security detail. Rafiq al-Kamal is a true Wahhabi believer and very loyal to my father. And if I had to guess, he’s starting to get a little suspicious about what’s going on in here.”

Chapter 31 Seraincourt, France

THE TEAM FILED SLOWLY FROM the room—everyone but Eli Lavon, who remained at his perch near the windows, and Gabriel, who settled into the place vacated by Sarah. He gazed at Nadia for a moment in respectful silence. Then, in a somber voice borrowed from Shamron, he proceeded to tell her a story. It was the story of a charismatic Islamic cleric named Rashid al-Husseini, of a well-intentioned CIA operation gone terribly wrong, and of a lethal terror network that was starved of the operating capital it needed to achieve its ultimate goals. The briefing was remarkably complete—indeed, by the time Gabriel finally finished, the weak autumn sun had set and the room was in semidarkness. Lavon was by then a mere silhouette, indistinguishable except for the wisp of disheveled hair that surrounded his head like a halo. Nadia sat motionless at the end of the long couch, feet drawn beneath her, arms folded under her breasts. Her dark eyes stared unblinking into Gabriel’s as he spoke, as though she were posing for a portrait. It was a portrait of an unveiled woman, thought Gabriel, oil on canvas, artist unknown.

From the adjacent room rose a swell of laughter. When it died away, there was music. Nadia closed her eyes and listened.

“Is that Miles Davis?” she asked.

“ ‘Dear Old Stockholm,’ ” said Gabriel with a slow nod.

“I’ve always been very fond of Miles Davis, despite the fact that my father, as a devout Wahhabi Muslim, briefly attempted to prevent me from listening to music of any sort.” She paused for a moment, still listening. “I’m also quite fond of Stockholm. Let us hope Rashid hasn’t put it on his list of targets.”

“A very wise man once told me that hope is not an acceptable strategy when lives are at stake.”

“Perhaps not,” said Nadia, “but hope is very much in vogue at the moment in Washington.”

Gabriel smiled and said, “You still haven’t answered my question, Nadia.”

“Which question is that?”

“What was more painful? Learning that your father was a terrorist or that he had misled you?”

She stared at Gabriel with an unsettling intensity. After a moment, she removed the pack of Virginia Slims from her handbag, lit one, and then offered the pack to Gabriel. With a curt wave of his hand, he declined.

“I’m afraid your question displays a profound ignorance of Saudi culture,” she said finally. “My father was highly Westernized, but he was still first and foremost a Saudi male, which meant he held my life in his hands, quite literally. Even in death, I was afraid of my father. And even in death, I never permitted myself to feel anything like disappointment in him.”

“But you were hardly a typical Saudi child.”

“That’s true,” she conceded. “My father granted me a great deal of freedom when we were in the West. But that freedom did not extend to Saudi Arabia or to our personal relationship. My father was like the al-Saud. He was the absolute monarch of our family. And I knew exactly what would happen if I ever stepped out of line.”

“He threatened you?”

“Of course not. My father never spoke a cross word to me. He didn’t have to. Women in Saudi Arabia know their place. From the time of their first menses, they’re hidden away beneath a veil of black. And heaven help them if they ever bring dishonor upon the male who holds sway over them.”

She was sitting slightly more erect now, as if mindful of her posture. The uncertain light of the fire had erased the first evidence of aging from her face. For now, she seemed the insolent, shockingly beautiful young woman whom they had first seen several years earlier floating across the paving stones of Mason’s Yard. Nadia had been an afterthought during the operation against her father, an annoyance. Even Gabriel could not quite believe that the spoiled daughter of Zizi al-Bakari had been transformed into the elegant, thoughtful woman seated before him now.

“Honor is very important to the psyche of the Arab man,” she continued. “Honor is everything. It was a lesson I learned quite painfully when I was just eighteen. One of my best friends was a girl named Rena. She came from a good family, not nearly as rich as ours, but prominent. Rena had a secret. She’d fallen in love with a handsome young Egyptian man she’d met in a Riyadh shopping mall. They were meeting secretly in the man’s apartment. I warned Rena that she was playing a dangerous game, but she refused to stop seeing the man. Eventually, the mutaween, the religious police, caught her and the Egyptian together. Rena’s father was so mortified he took the only course of action available to him, at least in his mind.”

“An honor killing?”

Nadia nodded her head slowly. “Rena was bound in heavy chains. Then, with the rest of her family looking on, she was thrown into the swimming pool of her home. Her mother and sisters were forced to watch. They said nothing. They did nothing. They were powerless.”

Nadia lapsed into silence. “When I found out what had happened,” she said finally, “I was devastated. How could a father be so barbaric and primitive? How could he kill his own child? But when I asked my father those questions, he told me it was Allah’s will. Rena had to be punished for her reckless behavior. It simply had to be done.” She paused. “I never forgot how my father looked as he spoke those words. It was the same expression I saw on his face several years later when he was watching the collapse of the World Trade Center. It was a terrible tragedy, he said, but it was Allah’s will. It simply had to be done.”

“Did you ever suspect your father was involved in terrorism?”

“Of course not. I believed that terrorism was the work of the crazy jihadis like Bin Laden and Zawahiri, not a man like my father. Zizi al-Bakari was a businessman and an art collector, not a mass murderer. Or so I thought.”

Her cigarette had burned down to a stub. She crushed it out and immediately lit another.

“But now, with the passage of enough time, I can see that there is a link between Rena’s death and the murder of three thousand innocent people on 9/11. Each had a common ancestor—Muhammad Abdul Wahhab. Until his ideology of hatred is neutralized, there will be more terrorism and more women like Rena. Everything I do is for her. Rena is my guide, my beacon.”

Nadia glanced toward the corner of the room where Lavon sat alone, veiled by darkness.